The Burdens of Shaohao Part One: Doubt

Hot on the heels of the prelude released this weekend, Blizzard has just released the next official installment in The Burdens of Shaohao. Part one of the tale follows chapters three and five of the in-game book, The Emperor's Burden. Reading the complete text gives you a nice bit of lore, and the quest The Seven Burdens of Shaohao. However, there's a distinct difference between reading an in-game book and watching an animated version of it — the gorgeous artwork and animation really brings the tale to life.

What I really like about these animated shorts is that they expand on what we've already been told — rather than a simple seven days of fighting, we get to see exactly how Shaohao defeated the Sha of Doubt. I'm hoping that as the tale goes on, we'll get more of these little details to help fill the story in. It'd be great to see exactly what happened when Shaohao pulled Pandaria away from the rest of the world in detail. As it turns out, we won't have long to wait — according to Lead Story Developer Micky Neilson on Twitter, we should see the rest of the story released over the course of this week.

This is a pretty new direction for the Blizzard lore department — we've never seen animated works like this before. If you like the tale and the methods used, I'd suggest letting Blizzard know by liking the video on Youtube and leaving a comment. Who knows, it may get us more of these delightful little pieces in the future!